The Blackest Night, The Darkest Dawn
by magicjohnson32
Summary: "Love is like a rose. It looks beautiful on the outside...but there is always pain hidden somewhere."    When you are the abused child of histories most reviled wizarding family, the pain is never hidden.
1. Chapter 1

**Hey, I doubt any of will recognise this, but this is actually a repost of a story I started like a year ago but never finished. I got a few requests to keep going with it, and how could I say no? So here we are, the continuation has arrived. Pls. read and review, it's always appreciated.**

Wind and sheets of rain whipped around the house, trying to find a gap in its thick stone walls. Thunder roared through the night sky, as the gale blew debris through the decrepit grounds. A crackle of lightening briefly illuminated the harrowing surrounds, and then the darkness returned. The three-storey Manor house's windows were being pelted with hailstones, but its occupants were unconcerned, a state that was not unusual for them.

The firelight flickered in the boys eyes, as he lay face down on the carpet, panting. His body had a light sheen of sweat covering it, but it had nothing to do with the heat that was emanating from the hearth. His blood pooled gently on the material as he moaned again, the figure above him viciously kicking him in the ribs, causing him to double up, protecting his injured side.

The dark figure moved towards the desk in the room, and opened one of the drawers with a creek. An object was removed from its depths, and held mockingly in front of the boy's eyes.

"Do you know what this is, boy?" the figure enquired.

"A cat o'nine-tails, sir," managed the prone figure, his eyes widening with fear.

"That's right," grinned the boy's father, as he flicked his wrist viciously, and his son screamed in agony as the skin was flayed off his back.

Scorpius Malfoy awoke in his four-poster bed, as the first lights of morning punctured the hangings of his bed. He groaned as he rolled over, suddenly jerking still in his bed, as he previous evening came back to his consciousness. Instinctively, he ran his hands over his body, wondering whether the scars from his previous evening's abuse were still present.

They never were, however, and this morning was no exception. No matter what vicious atrocities Draco Malfoy may have committed against his son, he was always sure to mend him afterwards. There could be no scars to prove the damage had occurred, and he always awoke after blacking out from the pain in his own bed. It was just the way things were. That was how the Malfoy family was now.

The Malfoy family had suffered after the war. Their money might have remained, but every shred of respectability and acceptance had been torn up and burned before their eyes. No indignity had been greater than his father and grandparents being forced to face a full court hearing, after the vicious laws from the previous war had been reinstated for the trial of suspected Voldemort followers.

Scorpius had been compelled to watch along with his mother, Astoria Greengrass, who had become Astoria Malfoy two months after the war was finished, as his father was held in a metal cage, with spikes preventing him from even breathing out to his full extent. Staring straight ahead, Draco had heard all the charges against him and he said not a word. His case had been delayed almost nine years as the evidence was gathered and the more serious trials for accused death-eaters were heard, and his five years in Azkaban had left him even more gaunt and sallow than nature had made him.

Finally, once all the evidence had been heard, a man, of no more than 27 had gotten to his feet, and had begun to speak. Immediately, Draco Malfoy had shouted at him, told him to stand down, that no man would speak on his behalf, but he was silenced. The man defended his father, speaking of Draco's unwillingness, of his forced complicity, and his unlucky lot in life. All through it, Draco had shaken furiously, unable to speak, but cutting himself on the vicious interior of his confines.

The man who had spoken for him was Harry Potter, and for Draco Malfoy, it was the largest wound his pride could have received. The 'Golden Boy', 'Saviour of the World', and most famously 'The Boy Who Lived,' had not only had Draco released on bail from his time in Azkaban so that he could go home to his wife, admittedly while under constant auror guard, but he had managed to have his almost certain conviction quashed.

Similarly, Harry Potter had spoken at the trials of his grandparents, which had been held the year previous, defending them, but in the process, taking away whatever honour and pride their existence had seen fit to leave them with. They had returned to Malfoy Manor as broken and bitter souls.

Draco's grandfather was the only one who had held out any hopes of restoring the family name. Lucius had desperately hung his hopes on his grandchild, and had taken him under his wing, teaching him everything he considered important to becoming a stately family once more. Needless to say, Scorpius' magical education had started as soon as he could grasp a wand.

Then he had gone to Hogwarts, and hope had begun to spring up in his young mind. He could see a path, a light as he boarded the train to the famous castle. It had lasted all of five minutes, before James Potter and his friends dragged him out into the corridor of the train and beat him to within an inch of his life.

He was sorted into Slytherin, but it made no difference. His house had all moved on, and he was like a disease to them, and everyone avoided him at all costs. James Potter, Fred Weasley and to a lesser extent, Teddy Lupin, made his life a living hell. After the first few occasions, he began to avoid the nurse altogether, as well. She had expressed her fury at him, refusing to believe his 'lies' about the bullying, and telling him to stop fighting.

The hope that had sprung up within him was crushed before it even had a chance to flower. And then, it happened. He'd arrived in the Great Hall, and all eyes were on him. Even the teaching staff, Professor McGonagall, the beloved headmistress, included, were all staring at him as if he was a piece of filth that they'd been unfortunate enough to step in.

The looks in and of themselves were nothing unusual, but the fact that the entire school were doing it was what made it so disconcerting. He had moved to the Slytherin table, and trying to ignore the staring faces; he'd picked up the paper, and then blanched, dropping it straight onto his toast.

_Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy, arrested in relation to a brutal triple homicide of muggle family._

That was the headline that shouted at him. Scorpius had run out of the hall, down to his common room, and collapsed onto his bed, and sobbed.

It was that Christmas that the beatings started. He clearly remembered the first one. They had returned from his grandfather's trial, where he had been sentenced to life imprisonment, and his father had simply dragged him into his study, and beaten him so badly he'd thought he was going to die.

It was not the last time, by any means.

Scorpius' life had spiralled down, further, if anyone could have believed it possible. He now dreaded both home and school. At home, his father beat him, taking pleasure from his only child's pain, and at school, it was not much different. After the muggle killings, James Potter had broken both his legs, and then made him invisible, gagged him, and left him in a corner of the dungeons. He'd fainted from the agony, come to in the middle of the night, and been forced to half drag himself to the hospital wing. Once again, the nurse, who Scorpius learned had lost two children to Death-Eaters in the war, grudgingly mended his broken bones.

Scorpius' only comfort was his studies. He had no acquaintances, let alone friends, and so was left with all the time that others spent socialising to study. Added to the fact that he was naturally very intelligent, and a supposed brilliant spell-caster, he made great strides in his education. He needed to; he had nothing else to live for.

In prison, his grandmother had passed away, the incarceration having weakened her already strained will to exist. Scorpius had been pulled out of school to attend the event at the Azkaban prison, at which only his father and mother had been present.

Astoria Greengrass was only Scorpius' mother by name. She knew everything that her husband did to their only son, but she sat in the drawing room of the house nearly all day every day, in a chair next to her husband, staring blankly into the fire, and drinking heavily. The house elves maintained her, as she drank herself into submission.

His father didn't work, he existed in a similar fashion, sleeping and drinking away his life. He also smoked huge cigars, as he relived history from his chair that was next to his wife's.

Scorpius pulled out his textbooks, spreading them on the bed, as his door creaked open. In wandered a house-elf, holding a tray.

"Master Malfoy, I have brought you some breakfast," squeaked the creature, as Scorpius smiled kindly, a rare occurrence in his current residence. Twinkie was his favourite house-elf of the three that his parents kept. She brought him breakfast in bed every morning, so he didn't risk running into his parents or even crossing their minds as they roused themselves from their alcohol induced stupor.

She pushed the tray onto the bedside table that made up one of the three pieces of furniture in his room, the other two being his bed and a very sparsely packed cupboard that contained his small collection of clothing. After she had pushed the tray onto the flat surface, she deposited a letter on his lap, and hung a suit bag over the end of his bed.

"Grandfather's funeral," groaned Scorpius, his eyes falling on the bag, before he noticed the letter. He was surprised at the piece of mail, it was heavier than usual, but since he was going into his final year, maybe they had extra information to convey. He knew it had to be from the school; he never received mail of any other kind.

He knew it wasn't an extended booklist, because he already owned everything that was on it, a virtue of having procured a copy, along with the library's copies of each of them. While the other staff may have refused to accept that Scorpius was as different as it was possible to be from his father, Madame Pince had been far more accommodating, especially after he'd given her a very abridged version of his circumstances, she had allowed him to borrow copies of school texts out for the entire year.

He neatly opened the letter, and emptied the contents out on his bed. As he suspected, there was a welcome letter for his final year, along with his booklist. The added weight, however, came in the form of a badge. He picked it up off the sheet on his bed, and turned it over.

**HEAD BOY**

That was the inscription. Head Boy. Scorpius swallowed, his eyes widening in disbelief. He dropped it like it had scalded him, and scrambled to find the accompanying letter. Surely it was a mistake. Surely no one in their right mind would have made him Head Boy. Albus Potter was going to kill him if it turned out he'd even received in error. His next thought was that it had to be a practical joke.

He located the letter, and read the top line. There, in neat handwriting, was his name. It was addressed to him. He read the whole page, and then threw it down on the bed in disgust. Whoever thought this was funny had a sick sense of humour, he thought to himself, shoving them both in his top draw, along with the handmade calendar, on which he was recording how many days left before the new year began. He was down to just two days remaining.


	2. Chapter 2

**Sorry about the short chapter, but I'm trying for consistency over length. Please read and review!**

He found himself standing in the front hall in his dress robes at midday, as his father joined them, also wearing his robes. His mother stood there in a shin length black dress, with a veil covering her face. His father had passed away two days previous and his funeral was being held at Azkaban prison. Again, like his grandmother's funeral, only Scorpius and his parents would be attending.

Scorpius stood in the front hall, a handful of floo powder clasped in his fist. In an unspoken agreement, his mother threw her powder into the fire first, and disappeared with a crack. Scorpius looked at his father, who stared him in the eyes.

Scorpius knew that look; he was daring Scorpius to try running away. Daring him to try and flee. Scorpius threw the powder onto the fire and stepped in, and turned to look at his father, who smiled cruelly. They both had come to the realisation, as they always did, that even if Scorpius did run, he had nowhere to go, no money to live on, and certainly no one to care for him. He was tortured to within an inch of his miserable life, but he was allowed to eat meals for the most-part, something he would not get anywhere else.

Draco Malfoy stepped out of the fireplace behind his son, and they stood silently, the burden of experience giving them the knowledge that their guide was on the way. The room was bare, aside from the fireplace, and the door could only be opened from the outside, with the fire providing the only light, flickering off the cold stone.

Scorpius stood stock still, trying to ignore the sensation clawing at his chest ever so gently, that one that made him feel slightly uncomfortable. He knew that it had no effect on either of his parents, but the fact that he could even feel it was an amazing relief to Scorpius. The Dementors may have been sucking the happiness out of him, but the knowledge that something tucked away inside made him happy was well worth the discomfort.

The door swung open, and a man appeared, looking nervously at the trio. He was an auror, but he looked to be barely older than Scorpius, and he smiled nervously too, before inviting them to follow him.

They were led through the hallways, where, if Scorpius strayed too close to the walls, he could swear he could hear the screams. He endeavoured to stay directly in the centre of the corridors after that. They were eventually led into another dingy room, where a stone table with a solid stone coffin lay in the centre of the room, with a waist high barrier surrounding it. Scorpius recognised it.

"Would you like to say any final words?" enquired the nervy auror, but Draco simply shook his head, staring at the stone box intensely. The man half shrugged, and then pulled a lever in the wall.

It had shocked Scorpius the first time, as the floor and table underneath the coffin disappeared, but this time he was ready for it. His father turned away before the coffin even hit the foaming sea that raged fifty feet below, and it was swallowed by the mindless blue beast, the white waves crashing below as the spray found its way through the opening before the opening was closed once more, and silence reigned again.

"I'll see you in my study this evening, boy," his father had commanded, before they'd even made it back to Malfoy Manor.

Scorpius awoke before the sun had risen and got up, and dressed himself. He only had one or two of each article of clothing, and it was all very basic. On the very rare occasions that they had made public appearances, Scorpius had been forced to dress appropriately by his parents, using his father's old clothing, proving that old habits die hard.

So he packed his trunk, that he had inherited from his father, with his meagre possessions, and as an afterthought, he pulled open his draw, and tucked the badge and letter that had accompanied it into his pocket, and set about moving his trunk down the stairs into the main hall.

Ever since his second year, after his grandfather had been jailed, his parents had stopped taking him to Kings Cross at the beginning of the year. They'd simply just not done anything about it when it had come to the beginning of his third year. After a week, someone had turned up on the doorstep to find out what was going on, and to take Scorpius to school.

Draco had refused, saying he would do it himself. This had encompassed beating Scorpius until he could no longer raise his arm to hit him with whatever implement he'd chosen, and then putting him on the Knight Bus to Hogsmeade, without any money. Fortunately, the kind conductor had accepted his pleadings, and let him off with a warning. Ever since then, Scorpius had carried his trunk to Kings Cross in the early hours of the morning.

As he'd grown, this task had become easier. Being underage, he couldn't use magic, and so he was forced to carry his trunk to the station each year. When he'd down it at the beginning of fourth year, it had taken him the best part of six hours. Now, he could manage it in just over three.

The frosty morning cold bit at him as he walked, but his heart lightened with every step. Every step was taking him further away from Malfoy Manor and the horrors that existed for him within its walls.

Kings Cross was buzzing with its early Monday morning commuters, as they bustled on their way to work, passing by without a second glance at the boy who dragged his wooden trunk across the car park, and up the steps to where he could find himself a trolley.

Having loaded his trunk onto a trolley, he wheeled it through the station, for once glad that he was not carrying an owl or similarly magical animal, which drew so much attention to the young wizards and witches that made their way onto the Hogwarts Express on that morning.

Scorpius was early, a virtue of his early start, and he found the platform next to deserted, with only a few over eager first-year parents who were tearfully kissing their children goodbye already. The sight was one that made Scorpius brush his eyes, and shake his head. He was happy to be free, that was all that mattered. He couldn't ask for anything more than that. After this year, he could live his own life. The very thought brought a smile to his face, as he loaded his trunk onto the train, and went to find himself a carriage to settle down and re-read the transfiguration textbook for the fifth time that summer.


	3. Chapter 3

**Sorry about the late update, I'm trying to juggle stories, and this one got left behind. Anyway, hope you enjoy, and as always, please read and review!**

Scorpius sank back into the red, plush seat in his compartment, his book resting in the space beside him. The compartments were more reminiscent of an early nineteen hundreds smoking lounge, all dark woods and rich colours, than a train interior. To complete the image, the billowing smoke from the Hogwarts Express blanketed the milling crowd of eager children and wistful parents outside his compartment window.

The train was filling slowly, and as always, the older students embarked first, their parents the best drilled at relinquishing their grasp. This was in contrast to the parent's of the First Years who regularly acted as if they would prefer to part with multiple limbs as opposed to bid farewell to the offspring who were off to have the time of their lives.

A case in point was the woman who was directly beneath Scorpius' window, who appeared to be surgically attached to her clearly embarrassed son, while simultaneously shedding enough tears to declare the formation of a new ocean and issuing throttled screams of anguish that Scorpius envisaged would not have sounded out of place emanating from the lips of a banshee.

Scorpius knew he may have been just a tad bitter about the whole 'fawning and doting' parents concept, but he shrugged this insecurity off. He was supposed to be happy today, the first day of the new school year was his Christmas, and he deserved to enjoy it after his horrendous summer. Outside, the woman either lost her voice, or some charitable individual had slit her throat, but either way, it allowed Scorpius to continue his customary train-ride check that he knew each of his textbooks off by heart.

The improved nature of Scorpius' school life had undeniably coincided with a momentous occasion that had occurred the year before last; the graduation of James Sirius Potter, eldest son of Harry James Potter, from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

While the embargo on anyone doing anything remotely friendly for, let alone actually befriending Scorpius continued to be enforced by Albus, who had stepped into the void of king of the school and all-round sadistic jerk, and James' friends from the year below had continued their leader's 'legacy' of unwarranted torture and humiliation in his absence, Sixth Year had been such a marked improvement on Fifth Year, it was almost beyond belief. But it had been in Fifth Year that the consideration of actually murdering James Potter had crossed Scorpius' mind as a viable alternative.

Scorpius sat in his compartment as the train continued to fill with Hogwarts students, as the platform became more sparsely populated, and only the few, mainly first years, remained, eventually being tearfully allowed to board as the conductor shouted his final boarding call.

Scorpius' carriage remained mercifully empty, as the parade of faces passed by the window that led into the train's central corridor, students who boarded last looking for empty carriages for the duration of the journey.

No senior student was anywhere near desperate enough to take up residence in the compartment that Scorpius was residing in, and no junior student was brave enough to barge in on a senior, no matter how maligned said senior might be. It was a healthy equilibrium that Scorpius could have no complaints about. He still had nightmares about what James Potter and his gang had done to him on the train ride in Fourth Year.

Scorpius sat quietly, flicking casually through the pages of his transfiguration textbook, with his right hand in his pocket, unconsciously playing with the badge that he had slipped into it before loading his trunk onto the train an hour or so beforehand.

The letter was also there, and he pulled it out to peruse it once more, as he had already done countless times before. He had spent hours poring over it, his eyes searching for any sign that it might be a forgery. When his natural abilities failed him, he, with the resources available, set about magically testing its legitimacy, but he could find no fault.

Even McGonagall's signature was perfect, when he compared it to the letter welcoming him to his final year. Even more damning evidence was that it had arrived in the same envelope as the rest of his Hogwarts Seventh Year information, so if it had been a practical joke, the perpetrators would have had to have intercepted the owl and replaced it with their own. He'd tested the seal magically, but unless he was sorely mistaken, it had remained unbroken, and the envelope had not been tampered with.

The problem was, in Scorpius' head, it just didn't make sense. At all. How could it be explained by any reasonable individual? Scorpius had not been made a prefect in Fifth Year, despite his clear academic achievement. Nor had this been rectified in Sixth Year, when he had received 'Outstanding' on every single one of his OWLs.

He had a perfect behaviour record, and his teacher's struggled to find a single bad thing to say about him even despite his surname. In fact, the only criticism ever levelled at him was that he distracted other students, but as this always entailed a Potter or one of their gang having attempted to commit some horrific act against Scorpius, none of them ever really believed that he was anything other than a model student. Not that they'd ever admit it.

He sighed and returned both the badge and letter to his pocket, his mind virtually humming with activity. There had to be a reasonable solution to this dilemma of his. After a minutes consideration, he resolved that he would, with the premise of attempting to find the trolley and all the goodies it carried, he would make a trip up the train to the front carriage and take a quick peek into the prefects meeting to see if there was someone else with a badge.

He put his book up on the luggage rack, and silently made it invisible. He didn't want to have to explain to Madam Pince why he couldn't return the books she'd lent him, he needed the textbooks she was letting him have on year-long loan.

He slid the compartment door open, and stepped out into the corridor, the train rocking slightly from side to side as it thundered onwards towards Hogsmeade Station. He wandered down between the compartments, his head bowed to avoid being noticed. He walked quickly, until he came within the vicinity of the front compartment.

Gingerly, he tried to peer through the nearest window, a bead of sweat finding its way onto his forehead. He could see people sitting in the compartment, but he couldn't see the entire group without making his presence known.

"What the fuck are you doing, Malfoy?" came an all too familiar voice.

Scorpius' heart dropped. Of course _he_ was the one who busted him.

"I'm waiting for the food trolley?" Scorpius replied lamely, without turning around, silently begging every deity he could think of to let that excuse be enough for the boy.

He heard footsteps, and then a hand on his should wrenched him around, and pinned him to the window, as he stared into the face of Albus Potter.

"That can't be true, Malfoy, I know you don't have any money, I tried stealing it from you enough times, haven't I?" he scoffed, as his straggle of friends fanned out around them. "So what the fuck were you doing?"

Albus Potter was not an imposing boy, not even to First Years. Well, objectively he was not imposing. He stood a generous 5'8, had messy black hair, and wore glasses. Not exactly your stereotypical thug, but his looks belied his actions.

He had grown up with his brother, and the influence wasn't exactly hard to spot. He, for some reason, loved picking on Scorpius, but never did anything unless he had half a dozen of his friends and family to stand behind him in case Scorpius ever tried to fight back.

"Answer the question, Malfoy! What are you doing spying on the prefects meeting?" Albus demanded, shaking Scorpius by the front of his shirt, but still he stayed silent, his blue eyes staring straight back into Albus' green ones.

Students had begun to congregate in the corridor, as Albus threw Scorpius to the floor, and whipped out his wand. Scorpius lay there, on the ground, face down, his nose an inch from the carpeted corridor floor, as he waited for the inevitable curse. It didn't come, however.

"What the fuck?" exclaimed Albus, and Scorpius looked up. Albus was standing there comically, his hand raised, but his wand was nowhere to be seen.

"What is so important that you have to interrupt my first prefects meeting, dear cousin Albus?" came an authoritative female voice from behind a still shocked Albus.

Albus turned to reveal a furious looking Rose Weasley, Albus' wand firmly grasped in one hand.

"You better have a good excuse, or else I'm going to be sorely tempted to hex you into the middle of next week," she exclaimed, as everyone present shrunk down slightly.

Rose Weasley may have inherited her father's shock of red hair, but along with her mother's brains, she also inherited the persuasive personality that had seen her mother land the position of head of a ministry division. Coupled with an appearance that made the entire male population of Hogwarts weak at the knees, she was truly a force to be reckoned with.

"What is that?" she asked suddenly, pointing past Albus, to Scorpius, who blinked twice in surprise. Rose Weasley had never acknowledged his existence before, what was going on?

"Accio badge!" she said commandingly, and too late Scorpius realised his Head Boy badge had fallen out of his pocket.

"That's mine!" exclaimed Scorpius, making a desperate grab for the badge as it flew towards Rose's outstretched hand.

"What do you mean it's yours?" shouted Albus, "who did you steal this off, you absolute piece of scum!"

Albus had grabbed his wand off his shocked cousin, and shouted a curse which opened up a deep cut in Scorpius' cheek, which began to ooze blood onto the already red carpet.

"I didn't steal it," Scorpius panted, holding his wound, as blood seeped from between his fingers. "I've got the letter to prove it," he said, holding out the piece of parchment.

Rose grabbed it without even glancing at him, and read it quickly.

"He's forged it, clearly," said Albus derisively, but Rose shook her head, as she cast some spells on it.

"No, as amazing as it sounds, this letter is real, as far as I can tell," Rose breathed, glancing down at Scorpius with a look of incredulity on her face.

"That's absolute bullshit!" screamed Albus, pulling Scorpius to his feet, who was still clutching his bleeding cheek. "You're a lying, cheating piece of scum who isn't worthy to lick the dirt off my shoes, why the hell are you Head Boy? It's got to be a mistake; McGonagall hasn't gone completely batty as far as I know." He punctuated this by punching Scorpius on his other cheek and letting him fall back to the train floor, as there were some cheers from the onlookers.

"Well, this letter seems real, cousin, I think you may just be bitter about the fact that you weren't picked. Although, even having you as Head Boy would be better than spending a year with a _Malfoy_," she sneered, as Albus spat on Scorpius' prone body.

"Thanks Rosie," Albus derided, not looking away from Scorpius.

"However, I don't think anything can be done about it right here on the train, Al, I think we are just going to have to act like _he_ is really Head Boy until we get to school, and you can talk to McGonagall. Come on _Malfoy_, you're late for the prefect meeting," she announced to Scorpius, as she stalked back into the compartment.

As Scorpius slowly got to his feet, Albus pulled him by the collar, and whispered in his ear.

"You and I are not done, Malfoy, not by any means. This isn't over, either, I'm going to make you pay for this," he breathed in Scorpius' ear, before pushing him against the wall, and leading his friends away through the assembled crowd.

**I hope nobody likes the Potter clan too much. Or the Weasley's for that matter. Or Draco Malfoy. Really, if you like the protagonists in JK Rowling's books, you might have a problem with this story. But what the hey, I mean, I'm annoying everyone equally right?**


	4. Chapter 4

**Introducing...Rose Weasley. Yeah don't worry, you're not supposed to like her much.**

Scorpius tentatively slid the door open to find all eyes upon him. The compartment was the same decor as the others, but larger, with the red, plush bench seats on three sides, and a small table in the middle, which was currently occupied by a stack of papers.

He glanced around, and took the only remaining spare seat, right in the corner next to the Hufflepuff prefect with the acne. Rose sat in the middle, and she waited only until Scorpius was seated to continue what had obviously been a full-blown speech.

"Alright, now that everyone had deigned to join us," she said, throwing a filthy look at Scorpius, who was sitting with his face buried in his hands, "we may continue."

"Patrols will be from seven until eight and will include the first and second floor for Ravenclaw, the third and fourth..."

Rose droned on for almost half an hour, pausing only to hand out the timetable she'd drawn up for each of the prefects, and to point out that the Head Boy had shown no signs of contributing anything, not that it was unexpected apparently, before launching into the exhaustive list of rules that they were all supposed to know off by heart.

"And finally, do you have any questions? No? Do you have anything to contribute, Malfoy?" she added, looking spitefully at Scorpius.

"Uh... no, I think you covered everything in adequate detail," he replied, having been shocked back into the land of the living by the sound of his name.

"That would be right, wouldn't it?" Rose replied, "You didn't bother to do anything at all to prepare for your prestigious position, it's the Malfoy way, isn't it?" she goaded, while all of the prefects smiled mockingly at him.

"Actually, I spent all summer wondering whether it was some sort of practical joke pulled by your hilarious cousin Albus and the rest of your delightful family. And you're a Weasley and you're accusing me of getting things easy?" he replied, before standing up, glancing tentatively down the corridor and promptly walking out.

Rose Weasley sat in the compartment, staring at the door long after everyone else had departed, back to their friends, back to their lives. She knew for sure that her oversized group of hangers-on would be ready to make doe eyes at her, and proclaim her virtues to the stars, as they were always want to do.

But something stopped her. Something had been different, something had shocked her. The Malfoy boy, Scorpius, had done it. It had been a realisation, in fact, a realisation that she had never heard or seen him fight back before.

Those couple of sentences were the most combative she'd ever seen from him, and it wasn't like she hadn't been around when her cousins had been using him for sport. Who hadn't? But it was a hard realisation that he'd simply never crossed her mind before. Was she really that self-absorbed?

She shook head to clear it of all these confusing thoughts. She was Rose Weasley, the world was her oyster, it was her last year of school, and these things shouldn't be her problem. She stood slowly, sliding the compartment door open, and stepped out.

Rose Weasley was widely accepted, by both the male and female population of Hogwarts, to be the most attractive girl in the year level. She had curves, she was tall, a heart shaped face and the bright red hair that some girls would have cursed, but on Rose it simply enhanced the appeal.

Rose was also a Weasley. Her father was an Auror, her mother was head of the Department for Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. More importantly, however, they were best friends with Harry Potter and famous members of the 'golden trio' as the papers were so fond of referring to them as. For Rose, this meant fame, fortune and instant popularity.

As appetising as this combination may have sounded, for Rose, it wasn't always the most delectable. She resented the fact that girls seemed to see her as a way of climbing the social ladder, that approval from their 'queen' put them above one another, and the in-fighting made her feel nauseous. In reality, she only had two real friends.

Dominique Weasley waved to her as she picked her way through the compartment, as the 'yes' girls all pined about how much Rose had deserved her Head Girl position, and how beautiful she was looking, and how lucky she was, and all the rest.

She seated herself next to Dominique and Lauren Winters, her two real friends in the compartment of about twenty people, which was packed out into the corridor.

"Did you have a good summer?" she muttered to Lauren, as the entire compartment looked expectantly at her, before all beginning to scream and shout at once about what _they_ had done with their holiday.

"Yeah, we went skiing in France, you know that muggle sport?" grinned Lauren, almost shouting to be heard over the pack of hangers-on.

"Who's Head Boy, Rose?" asked Dominique leaning across to ask, suddenly intrigued, "because I heard from Annie that Albus was furious that he didn't get it."

"Didn't you hear?" Rose replied, looking between the two of them, "apparently it's Scorpius Malfoy!"

The look of horror on both their faces was all the support she needed.

Scorpius sat in his compartment with his robes on, a small smile on his face. He was Head Boy. He was Head Boy.

He kept saying it over and over in his head to try and make it sink in, but it wasn't working. It was too difficult to comprehend. How turned the badge over in his hand for the umpteenth time, when the compartment door slid open with a crash.

"You filthy piece of slime! That's my fucking badge, and you know it!"

Albus Potter was standing in the doorway, his face a beetroot red as he shouted, his anger causing spit to fly from his mouth. He furiously rifled his hands into his pockets searching for his wand, shouting some loud curse at Scorpius.

Scorpius, however, had also extracted his wand, and deflected the curse, which rebounded against the train window, shattering it, adding to the glass that had already been accrued on the compartment floor as a result of Albus wrenching the door open with so much force.

The train streaked on through the night, the wind and rain pelting in through the hole in the window, as Albus stood in the doorway, now flanked by three of his friends, which included the supposed heir to the Potter throne at Hogwarts, Hugo Weasley.

"You think you can fight back, Malfoy? You haven't got anyone Malfoy, no one in the world is going to help you," he mocked, leaning into the compartment, as Scorpius sat silently on the seat, leaning against the far wall as the rain lashed his face, and the wind whipped through his hair.

"And once we get to school, you're not even going to be Head Boy anymore. That's if you even make it to the front door," he added with a chuckle, and he nodded silently to his supporting cast.

Scorpius tried vainly to block away their hexes, but it was too much, the four boys overcame his defences, and he fell to the floor, his face down, as the bursts of light flashed eerily against the night sky, he curled up into a ball until the bursts had ceased.

"Oh, look, we've arrived at Hogsmeade Station, how disappointing, looks like your humiliation in front of the entire school is going to happen after all," Albus spat into Scorpius' upturned ear, before placing his shoe on Scorpius' head and grinding it into the floor, where the droplets of his blood mingled with the wet rain as the darkness of the night became his only companion.

Scorpius limped off the train, stepping down onto the now empty platform under the dim light of the lamps that lined Hogsmeade Station. The rain was ubiquitous, as it always was in Scotland, and the water ran through his matted hair and down the back of his sodden robes. He stumbled through the downpour, to the station exit.

He paused at the base of the school driveway, standing in the majestic gateway, staring up at the one place he truly felt at home. The grandiose stone structure rose from the rock it had been set upon in the centre of Hogwarts Lake, like a fearsome creature, turrets sprouting seemingly at random to create a very complex yet surreal sight. Peppered with what appeared from so far way to be fairy lights, the splendour of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was unrivalled in the mind of the youngest Malfoy.

The sound of Thestral's hooves on the driveway emanated through the darkness, and Scorpius could faintly discern the bobbing lanterns that they carried, as he peered through into the distance. He had been left behind.

Sighing slightly, and with scant regard for the hem of his robe or his shoes, which admittedly had not come to him in a wonderful state, he began the slow wander up the driveway to the distant lights.

**Yeah, yeah, short chapter, I know. Potentially another one tomorrow however :). If you're good boys and girls.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Don't ever let it be said that I don't keep my promises. Here's your newly minted chapter, all shiny and delectable. **

Rose sat at the Gryffindor table between Dominique and Lauren, chatting quietly about their summers. Dominique, of course, had spent much of her time with Rose as they were actually cousins, but it didn't stop them gossiping ad-infinitum about Dominique's sister's, Victoire's, upcoming wedding to Teddy Lupin.

It was the match made in heaven as far as the Potter-Weasley clan were concerned, and Teddy had only waited until Victoire was two years graduated from Hogwarts before he had popped the question. Rose could still remember girls from older years trying to befriend her to get closer to Teddy, not that he'd ever looked anywhere but the gorgeous half-Veela girl.

Actually, when she thought about it, several girls had attempted to use her to get closer to James as well, but it was needless effort. James was slightly less _honourable_ when it came to women's affections than his adopted older brother. Considerably less honourable, really, especially now he was a professional chaser and eligible for a call up to play Quidditch for England.

She glanced down the table at James' youngest brother, Albus, and smiled slightly. Funnily enough, girls in her year weren't climbing over themselves to get to Albus Severus Potter. Might have had something to do with the fact he wasn't any taller than Rose, or still sported the same round glasses and bowl cut that he had when he'd first started at Hogwarts, she thought, grinning to herself.

Professor McGonagall stood at the lectern, framed elegantly by candles, and in a stately manner held both hands up until there was silence in the Great Hall.

"_Welcome to another year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry,"_ she began, her voice as strong as it had been when Rose had been standing, waiting to be sorted in her first year. Professor McGonagall was seemingly timeless, unchanged as everything altered itself around her.

The usual niceties were observed, and sorting began promptly. Rose smiled nostalgically as she reminisced about when she had been sorted, the paralysing fear that despite what her mother had said that she would be sorted into Slytherin and no one in her family would talk to her again. In those days, her hair had been bushier and the couple of freckles that dotted her face had seemed an awful lot closer together.

She laughed gently along with the school as a poor boy tried to place the sorting hat on his head and promptly disappeared up to his shoulders in it. He was appropriately sorted into Hufflepuff as he totted from the raised platform to the amused cheers of the yellow house.

The latest Zambini offspring, who had inherited his father's black hair and dull eyes, was unsurprisingly gifted to Slytherin, who rose as one to welcome their newest son to the fold. Rose scanned the crowd, her eyes failing to spy her co-head at the table, even after they had resumed their seats after the final first year had been sorted.

Rose looked to the group of boys who considered themselves to be the 'popular' Slytherins, or at least were the most prominent ones, but Scorpius Malfoy was nowhere to be seen. Outside, thunder clapped, and the patter of rain became audible against the windows of the hall, as Professor McGonagall rose to speak once more.

"_...and finally, I would like to congratulate and introduce our Head Girl and Head Boy for this year, so if they could stand when called. Our Head Girl is Rose Weasley of Gryffindor!"_ Professor McGonagall gestured towards the Gryffindor table, whom all jumped to their feet, shouting and clapping their approval, mirrored slightly less enthusiastically but nonetheless supportively, by the rest of the school. Rose stood, blushing furiously at the response, but couldn't help notice the leering smile on her bespectacled cousin's face.

"_And this year's Head Boy, Scorpius Malfoy of Slytherin!"_ Professor McGonagal finished, gesturing to the Slytherin table.

The silence was deafening. No one spoke. Everyone simply stared at the Slytherin table, looks ranging from horror to outrage on the various faces. Rose once again scanned the table, wondering where Scorpius was. He hadn't received the warmest reception, but he was a Malfoy, surely this would be an opportunity to good to miss, being elevated to a position of power in front of the entire school.

Professor McGonagall was staring at the table intently, trying to sport the renegade Malfoy, when her ever eloquent cousin broke the silence.

"This is bullshit!" he cried loudly, smacking his goblet on the table. Murmurs of support and agreement rose from the student body at this sentiment, but Professor McGonagall looked lividly at Albus.

"_Three days detention for that, I think Mr. Potter. And it will be doubled for anything else you care to share with the school."_

But it was fruitless, cries that were slightly less profane were now emanating around the hall.

"_Where is Scorpius Malfoy?"_ cried the exasperated headmistress, as Albus took a risk.

"Replace him!" he cried over the din, and soon it became a chant taken up by other members of the student body.

"_Silence!"_ cried Professor McGonagall, her eyes shooting daggers at the son of The Boy Who Lived.

Whatever punishment that was about to be handed out to Albus, however, died in the Headmistresses throat as the doors to the Great Hall swung open, to reveal the boy in question.

* * *

><p>Every time Scorpius took a step, he squelched awkwardly. His only cloak was muddy from the knees downwards, and everything above the point was sodden to the core. To top off the elegance, Scorpius could taste blood dripping down from his temple where the glass from the broken window in his compartment on the Hogwarts Express had sliced through his skin.<p>

As he sloshed through the Entrance Hall, having slipped in through the schools front door which had been left ajar, he prayed to every deity he could name that the students would be busy eating, talking and making merry, and wouldn't even notice a hunched, saturated Slytherin shuffling towards his seat.

He reached the wooden doors of the Entrance Hall, which were so large a giant wouldn't have to duck to cross the threshold, and gently pushed them open.

Rose stared at the pathetic figure that stood, stooped in the doorway, and gawped along with every other person in the Hall.

He looked like he'd been dragged through the Black Lake, and then assaulted by the Giant Squid, just for good measure. His face looked like it was bruising on one side, and his blonde hair was matted by the water, and had turned a murky red colour over his left ear, which was obviously still bleeding.

Professor McGonagall was lost for words, and struggled to regain her composure.

"_Ahhh... thank you for your attention students, please return to your dorms. Could the Head Boy and Girl please remain behind... for extra instructions," _she managed.

Scorpius wasn't given a chance to vacate the doorway before a torrent of students began to pour in his way. He was bumped and buffeted by the mass of bodies, some deliberately targeting him, some just unable to go anywhere else. Soon though, the Hall was empty, as the last of the teaching staff filed off the stage, and with a range of expressions from shocked to repulsed, they followed their charges into the rest of the castle.

Finally, only Scorpius, Rose and Professor McGonagall remained. She had dismounted from her plinth upon which she stood to address the school, and stood next to the Gryffindor table, where Rose Weasley was clearly trying not to make her sidelong glances at Scorpius obvious.

The Headmistress simply stared at Scorpius with a mixture of bemusement and disappointment on her face.

"Care to explain yourself, Mr. Malfoy?" she enquired after an uncomfortable silence.

Scorpius winced slightly as he shifted nervously, not meeting her eyes.

"I... I had an accident," he mumbled lamely, fiddling with the sleeve of his robe.

"Apparently," Professor McGonagall answered coldly, her tone saying all that her lips did not about her opinion on the validity of Scorpius' excuse.

"Very well, I think, Mr. Malfoy, that the next time something like this happens, if it does, please notify someone, or at least make some attempt to find assistance. It doesn't bode well that our Head Boy doesn't show the slightest inclination to display initiative," she said, her mind clearly having moved on, however.

"Yes Professor," Scorpius replied dully, not looking up. The thought of telling the truth never even crossed his mind. He'd tried telling on James Potter once, in his first year. He'd gone to Professor Slughorn in his second week, and told him that James Potter had taken his book bag and thrown it off the Astronomy Tower.

Professor Slughorn, an enormously fat man very much in his later years of life had looked doubtfully at his least favourite member of his house, but nonetheless, taken the issue to Professor Longbottom, head of Gryffindor house. James Potter had been brought in, and produced five witnesses that backed up his alibi that he was in the library at the time Scorpius claimed it had happened.

Once he'd been cleared of all responsibility, James had cornered Scorpius in the third floor bathrooms and to the great amusement of his friend's, had dunked the blonde first year boy in the overflowing basin and had laughed uproariously when Scorpius had come up red-faced and spluttering, and then thrown up all over the tiled floor.

* * *

><p>Scorpius and Rose were then treated to a full recap of all the duties and expectations which were considered integral to the position, which Rose seemed to enjoy no end. She certainly took every opportunity to display her understanding of the role by asking as many questions as Professor McGonagall looked willing to answer.<p>

For his part, Scorpius simply stood there, staring slightly blankly at a particularly interesting patterning on a piece of the stone floor, and waited for it to be over. He wanted to go to sleep so this day could be over, and a new one could take its miserable place.

After almost a quarter of an hour, Rose was momentarily flummoxed for want of another query about her prestigious new position, and Professor McGonagall took the opportunity to wish the both of them the best of luck, and good night.

**Hmmm... having now updated two days in a row, I feel like I'm fulfilling my duty to you all. Hope you enjoyed the read, and I really honestly take the time to read all of your reviews, good and the bad, but the ones I really take notice of are those which have suggestions. Loooove people who are that engaged with the story, so keep them coming!**


	6. Chapter 6

**Wow. When I asked for some suggestions, some of you went to a lot of trouble. A LOT of trouble. Of course, I read them all, and took everything on board, the good, the bad and the downright ugly. Unfortunately, owing to the fact that some of the requests or suggestions contradicted each other, I can't incorporate them all. However, those of you who are concerned about the thickness of my skin; never fear! It's all going towards making me a better writer, which in turn makes this a better story. It's like that thing in the Lion King about the lions nurturing the grass and the circle of life... always seemed like a very unbalanced deal, lots of wildebeest dying compared to very few lions. Anyway. Please continue to give your opinions, as long as they are opinions. I'm hoping I haven't just opened myself up for a torrent of abuse... **

Rose sniffed slightly, as it became apparent that her unwelcome partner was well in need of not only some fresh clothes, but a long shower as well. He lagged behind her brisk pace as she passed out into the Entrance Hall, and began to climb the steps.

It was only when she was halfway up the steps that she realised that Scorpius had begun to descend on the other staircase, heading in the opposite direction, towards the dungeons.

"Malfoy, what can you possibly be doing at this time of night, on our first day back that is that important?" she demanded, "surely your slimy friends can await you presence just one more day?"

She saw that he was looking at her with a puzzled expression on his face, and she sniffed once more.

"You're Head Boy for goodness sake," she said, anger now palpable, "you can't be roaming the corridors doing whatever you feel like."

"I was just going to bed," Scorpius replied, looking unsure as to what he'd done to garner the response he had.

"Well then why are you heading towards the dungeons then? The Head's Dormitory is on the fourth floor!"

"Head's Dormitory?" Scorpius repeated, as if he hadn't heard of the place before, something Rose thought was preposterous.

"Yes, the Head's Dormitory, Malfoy, don't you know anything about your job?" said Rose, who turned tail and continued to march up the stairs at a ferocious pace.

Dimly, she was aware of the soft squelching noise as Scorpius followed her up the staircase.

When she reached the portrait of the three blind witches on the fourth floor, she stopped, and turned to address them as her repugnant male equivalent stood uncomfortably behind her, his hands buried in his pockets.

"Pig Snout!" she said clearly, and the three women stopped chattering silently long enough to swing open and reveal their new quarters.

Scorpius' mouth fell open in awe as he followed the ever-brisk Rose Weasley into their recently acquired accommodation. The room was elegantly furnished, with a fireplace surrounded by three plush couches, the roaring fire warming the room comfortably. There were paintings on the walls, desks by each of the windows, and two separate doors, one to the left and the other to the right.

To Scorpius' eye, the interior was warm and inviting, and suddenly the problems that being Head Boy posed seemed insignificant compared to what was on offer here. This would be his sanctuary, his solace, and he couldn't help smiling broadly despite everything that had occurred that day.

"What are you smirking about Malfoy?"

Rose Weasley was standing in the doorway of the room to the right, looking at him peculiarly, and Scorpius realised he must have looked like a fool, so he dropped his head again. When no answer was forthcoming, Rose continued as if nothing had happened.

"Well, my trunk is here, so I'm guessing this is my bedroom. Do try not to be late for breakfast tomorrow, Malfoy, I at least value my position and don't want you undermining it by being tardy constantly. I know Malfoy's are used to everything waiting for their arrival, but don't expect anything like that from me," she said, and with that, she stepped into her room, and closed the door.

Scorpius followed suite, and stepped into his new bedroom, closing the door behind him. The sight before him made him almost giddy with happiness. His bed was generously large four-poster, and instead of coarse, uncomfortable bedding that was provided for him at Malfoy Manor, and he ran his fingers softly along the silk sheets that he would now sleep between.

His trunk was at the foot of his bed, and he shed his wet clothing onto the floor at the sight of his very own bathroom, and rushed at the opportunity to cleanse himself.

For Rose, the process of unpacking was laborious. She actually had two trunks, one inside the other, and although her second trunk was much smaller, it did in fact contain considerably more than her standard trunk that her parents had given her in her first year at Hogwarts.

Her second trunk was a gift from her mother, as talented a witch as any in the world, who'd presented her with a small trunk that was barely large enough to contain a pair of shoes by outwards appearances, but was actually bewitched with an undetectable extension charm that gave it an almost unlimited capacity.

While her mother had used the charm to transport the tools that had been needed to help defeat Voldemort, Rose used it to carry her extraordinary collection of clothing.

When she had finally finished unpacking, she set about ordering her school things, putting her textbooks onto the small bookshelf, placing her quills and parchment rolls onto the table. She also removed some personal belongings, such as the photo of the entire Potter-Weasley clan from the previous Christmas, and some pieces of jewellery that were both family heirlooms and gifts from other sources.

With her cupboard full to the gunnels, and her room now looking more like her bedroom in her parent's house in Godric's Hollow, she lay back on her bedspread and considered what had passed in that day.

In all honesty, she hadn't been surprised when her delightful cousin Albus hadn't been selected as Head Boy. He'd been so different before he'd come to Hogwarts, the very embodiment of humility and honesty. Rose knew that his older brother's influence had driven him to what he had become, essentially a bully who surrounded himself with sycophantic followers.

If only his father could see what his youngest son had morphed into, she knew Uncle Harry would set him straight.

Despite all this though, Albus was family, and she wasn't going to go against family no matter what. Albus might have lorded it over his fellow students, but for the most part it was fairly harmless posturing, however unattractive a quality it may have been.

Her mind shifted to the boy who had taken the place Albus considered to be rightfully his, and she couldn't help the anger that rose in her chest. He was a Malfoy, was there any other way?

She knew that the home he had come from had, in years gone by, housed the very worst of wizards and witches, had been the very place where her mother had been tortured, and her father and uncle locked up.

Where unspeakable cruelties had been committed, and yet, still the Malfoy's existed in wealth and comfort.

She hated the Malfoy's for never having had justice served for the wrongs they committed, and seeing their only child given a position of privilege made it all the worse.

The arrogance, the unrepentant self-importance that her father had taught her all Malfoy's possessed naturally meant that she was predestined to hate their very name, no matter what.

With this comforting thought, she drifted off to sleep, eagerly awaiting the first day of school in her last year at Hogwarts.

Scorpius awoke with a shout, in the midst of writhing in his sweat sodden sheets. He slowly unclenched the white-knuckled grip his had taken upon his pillow, and sat up slowly. His body glistened with perspiration that only his nightmares brought. He ran a nervous hand through his slick hair as he peeled back his sheets, and slipped onto the carpeted floor.

The darkness outside told him it was early, but he had no desire to go back to sleep. Not with what awaited him when he closed his eyes. His one blessing was that he no longer shared a dormitory with four other boys, where they would regularly berate and mock him for his troubled sleep.

For Scorpius though, nightmares were much better than the reality of his father's study in Malfoy Manor.

He shivered slightly, as the warmth of the bedding deserted him, and he set about preparing himself for the day to come. He washed and cleaned himself thoroughly, and dressed himself in the uniform that hadn't been drenched the evening before.

Unfortunately for Scorpius, his collection of robes ran to only a single set he had inherited from his father. Scorpius was now a good couple of inches taller than Draco Malfoy had been, and the robes stopped short of the top of his battered, muddy shoes, not that it mattered much given that the hem of his black and green robes was still damp.

The only clothing that Scorpius owned, he had inherited from his father, and all of it was school uniform. When he wasn't at school, he got by with wearing one of his two school shirts or two pairs of black school pants, apart from on special occasions which called for a spare set of his father's dress robes.

His school shirts were uncomfortable, and so he left the top button undone as he slowly tied his father's green and silver Slytherin tie. Slipping on his damp cloak reluctantly, he did his best to depart for an early breakfast without ruining his only remaining clean set of school clothes.

Rose awoke as the dawn broke, as she did every morning. Rising quickly, she dressed herself, relishing the feeling of being in her uniform once more.

She slipped into her skirt from the year previous, despite the fact that her mother had bought her a completely new set of school clothes for that year. Hermione and Rose didn't see eye to eye on the issue of hem lines, and Rose had been forced to smuggle shorter skirts in.

When she was ready to go down to the Great Hall for breakfast, she slipped out of her bedroom, into the Head's Dormitory common room. The door to Scorpius' room was closed, and Rose grimaced.

Of course he showed no signs of rising at a respectable hour, and doing anything like greeting the new first years.

Of course a Malfoy couldn't be expected to uphold the honour of such a prestigious position.

She wasn't about to have a slacking, inappropriate partner bringing her down, however, and she marched across the room and rapped firmly on the door.

Gaining no response after half a minute, she repeated her assault on his door, only this time slightly firmer. When after a minute she found herself still ignored, she banged on the door with her palm and shouted loudly the occupant's name.

When even her cries of "Malfoy!" went unheard or ignored, she resolved that this travesty would not go unnoticed. She tried the handle and found the door to be unlocked, so she stormed in, ready to rouse Scorpius from his slumber.

To her immense surprise, and retrospective embarrassment, the room was apparently empty. The bed was made, but a quick search of his bathroom brought nothing but guilt for the invasion of privacy she had committed.

She departed his room quickly, closing the door behind her, before muttering to herself about Head Boy's with no consideration for rules, wandering the halls in the early hours of the morning. She set off for breakfast without a second thought.

"Mr. Malfoy, why are you wearing that cloak?"

Scorpius was sitting at the Slytherin table, the only person in the Great Hall, or so he'd thought. It was just the way he liked it, just him, the delectable cooking of the schools house elves and a book from the library.

He turned to find Professor McGonagall staring at the muddy hem of his cloak with some surprise.

"It's cold, Professor," he replied uncertainly.

"No, Malfoy, why are you wearing that cloak in particular? It's filthy!"

Scorpius Malfoy knew his parents would never allow him in their house again if they found out he'd told the truth, so he lied as he had always done.

"I forgot to pack any spares," he answered quietly, and Professor McGonagall shook her head.

"That is very careless, Mr. Malfoy, I expect better of my Head Boy. Well, go to the lost property cupboard and pick out whatever you need until your mother mails you the ones you are missing. Most of that stuff has been in that cupboard for years. I can only imagine Astoria's reaction to such news."

Scorpius could too, but he knew his mental picture was probably slightly different to the headmistresses at the thought of inconveniencing his mother or father with such a request. The thought made him swallow tightly.

"How are your mother and father, Malfoy? I haven't seen them for probably six or seven years now," Professor McGonagall said, sounding more kindly.

"Same as ever, Professor," Scorpius replied, not meeting her eyes.

"I'm sorry to hear that," muttered the Headmistress, as she wandered away, and Scorpius smiled to himself. Professor McGonagall had always been the one teacher who'd never judged him by his surname, and even after his grandparents had been arrested, she'd remained civil to him.

**I always liked Professor McGonagall, and who's going to believe that she'd have an irrational hatred? No one, of course not. She was like Dumbledore-lite in tartan. Also, some people are concerned that much of the hatred for Scorpius, particularly Rose's, is completely baseless. I do have a justification in mind, but it's only ever going to be partial. The theme is supposed to be prejudice, it's like reverse blood-prejudice against pure-bloods, by nature it doesn't make sense. Much like racism...**


	7. Chapter 7

**First off, a few excuses. I have literally been snowed under with assignments and school work, and then I literally went to the snow! A week and a half of skiing was great, but now I'm back, and writing again. Hope you enjoy it, and as always, please read and review.**

Rose Weasley walked into the Great Hall with a smile on her face. The first day of school was one of her favourite days of the year, but her smile turned into a frown once she spied the only other student in the hall.

Sitting at the Slytherin table was Scorpius Malfoy, and she worked hard to keep the surprise from her features. He looked up when she entered, and quickly ducked his head again when he registered that she was staring back at him. Quickly gathering his things, and conspicuously studying his timetable, he shuffled past her and out the door.

That was indeed puzzling. She had expected that Scorpius Malfoy would be off committing nefarious misdeeds of one sort or another, not simply having a very early breakfast. This conundrum frustrated her infinitely, because she then tried to recall why this had been the assumption she had made, and drew a blank.

What led her to think automatically that Scorpius would be up to no good? When she was completely flummoxed, she settled on the fact he was a Malfoy, and began to scan her new timetable.

It was nearly an hour before anyone else she knew appeared in the Great Hall, and she smirked at the sight of Dominique and Lauren stumbling into breakfast looking bleary eyed and disgruntled at the resumption of early morning starts.

It was well known in the Weasley household that Dominique was virtually impossible to co-exist with prior to her morning coffee, so Rose had one lined up that she simply placed in her cousin's hand as the grumpy blonde slid down next to her.

"Good morning!" Rose said brightly to the pair of them.

"Could have fooled me," muttered Dominique into her coffee.

"Morning Rose," managed Lauren, as she retrieved some toast.

"Here are your timetables," Rose said, handing out the two pieces of paper, to which she received muted thanks from Lauren and a cursory grunt from Dominique.

"I heard Teddy and Victoire broke off their engagement," Rose said.

"WHAT!" screamed both her friends in unison.

"There you go, that wasn't hard, was it?" Rose mocked, grinning, "Although I think crushing on your sister's fiancée is frowned upon in polite circles Dom."

Dominique managed to recover sufficiently to look coldly at Rose.

"No such problems for me though," Lauren said smugly, "and I'm not family, so James isn't out of bounds either."

Both Rose and Dominique choked on the different breakfast components they were consuming.

"If you even so much as touch James, I'm applying for a dormitory transfer," Dominique replied, "because one of those things he's caught is bound to be contagious."

"That's your cousin you're talking about there," Lauren pointed out.

"Moving on from dear James' rather doubtful mantra of quantity over quality," Rose said firmly, so her friends turned on her instead.

Lauren grinned at her instead, the smile of a killer deciding to switch prey.

"Alright then Rose, what's sharing a dormitory with a Malfoy like? Do you think the slime trails will come out of the carpet?" Lauren asked, but Rose shrugged in a non-committal way.

"Oh come off it Rosie, surely he was unbearable, I can only imagine what sharing a dormitory with him would be like," Dominique said, finishing off her toast.

"Actually, he's a bit weird," Rose said hesitantly.

"Thanks for that, Sherlock," Lauren replied, as the other two looked confused. Lauren was muggle born, she often said weird things the other two didn't understand. After a while, they began to ignore it wherever possible.

"Yeah well, anyway, he was awake before I was, and you know that filthy cloak he had yesterday? I'm fairly sure I saw him wearing it again today, which makes no sense at all. The Malfoy's are filthy rich, it's not like he's going to be short of clothing," Rose said.

"You're thinking about him too much," Dominique announced, "just let Albus beat the stuffing out of him and ignore him. It's worked for the last six years. Now, what have we got first?" she continued looking at her timetable.

"Well, if you'd actually managed more than four OWLs you might have Transfiguration with Rose and I..."

"Screw you."

"She'd have to, cause it's not like Teddy is about to, is it?" Rose smirked.

* * *

><p>Scorpius located the lost property closet with an unrestrained sense of glee. It was essentially a large broom cupboard on the second floor, filled up to Scorpius' neck with misplaced items of clothing and other belongings.<p>

He located two sets of Slytherin robes, and two more shirts, one of which appeared to be the perfect size, and the other which was bigger than was ideal, but he wasn't complaining. He was about to close the cupboard, but then he recalled Professor McGonagall's words about how the clothes were essentially abandoned. He couldn't resist 'borrowing' a grey, hooded tracksuit jacket, or the matching tracksuit pants. He added a pair of stray singlets for good measure, and then spied a nice pair of jeans as well.

The muggle trainers that were less than half a size too big were added to the pile, and Scorpius smiled happily as he grabbed a warm looking blue hooded jacket as well, and bundling them all up in his cloak, he rushed back towards his dorm with his treasure trove.

Hanging up his new acquisitions gave him a fresh sense of satisfaction, and before he knew it the bell was chiming for the beginning of class.

He rushed to consult his timetable, and grabbing his copy of _A Guide to Advanced NEWT Transfiguration, _courtesy of the library, from his trunk, and bolted for the door.

* * *

><p>Professor McGonagall was one of Rose's favourite teachers, as she had been for her parents, or at least her mother, anyway. Despite the fact she was approaching her 90th birthday, the Hogwarts Headmistress had insisted on continuing in her post as the Transfiguration teacher also, despite the fact it was unheard of to do so.<p>

The Hogwarts Headmistress was respected by every student of the school, and as Rose and Lauren slipped into their seats in the classroom, the elderly lady swept into the room with the grace and elegance of someone half her age.

"I assume I need not remind you the importance of your seventh and final year at Hogwarts; you are here because you are each one of the few who gained the required grade in your OWLs to continue with this subject," she began, and then scanned the room with a keen eye.

"Not all of you are here however; where is Mr. Malfoy?"

"Sorry Professor," came a voice from the door, as it opened on cue.

"Ah, Mr. Malfoy, you've chosen to join us," she said coldly, "I assume you have found an adequate replacement for that ruined cloak in the lost property cupboard then?"

Pockets of laughter at the irony of a Malfoy being forced to resort to using second hand robes broke out, and one of Albus' friends shouted something out to which the entire group dissolved into laughter.

"You will be joining Mr. Potter in detention, I think Mr. Browning, for that remark. I would suggest you find a seat Mr. Malfoy and don't be late for one of my classes again."

* * *

><p>Rose absent-mindedly flicked through her copy of <em>A Guide to Advanced NEWT Transfiguration, <em>while Professor McGonagall began writing on the blackboard, or at least, bewitching a stick of chalk to do so.

The only spare seat was two rows in front of her, and she watched as Scorpius slid into it, and placed his textbook on the table. She immediately noted that he had certainly changed robes, and the idea of him being forced to resort to second hand clothing puzzled her no end.

She couldn't help watching as he removed a quill from the inside of his cloak, and glanced around the classroom. He was the only student in the room who did not have a book bag, and she watched as he surreptitiously removed his wand and silently refilled his ink bottle from the inkwell on his desk. It was all very strange.

"Ms. Weasley, kindly stop daydreaming and pay attention! I am beginning to wonder whether my Head Boy and Girl aren't proving highly inappropriate choices!" barked the Headmistress, staring at Rose with a mixture of anger and surprise.

Rose was surprised herself. She never zoned out in class, and on her first day and all! Apologising, and cursing Malfoy under her breath for giving her cause to do so, she picked up her quill and began copying out what was on the blackboard.

* * *

><p>"Now, in the second half of this lesson I would like you to practice the spells, the mechanics of which I hope you are familiar with now."<p>

Professor McGonagall was surveying her class sternly, as Scorpius finished writing the final line of notes on the blackboard, and set his quill down.

"You will pair up, and one of you will perform the self-transfiguration, and then your partner will demonstrate their ability to undo that alteration. Self-transfiguration is a difficult art, and you will all master it at different speeds, so I will not set a target object. Just select one you feel comfortable with. Needless to say however, I expect to hear no sounds when these spells are being performed, if you cannot perform them non-verbally you shouldn't be present in my class. Now find a partner and get started."

Scorpius cringed, and sat unmoving, as the people around him muttered to each other about the formation of pairs. Scorpius turned hopefully to the boy next to him, but he had already found a buddy over the other side of the room, and had moved toward him.

"Who does not have a partner? Come on, there is an odd number of you, there has to be one!" Professor McGonagall called, and shamefaced, Scorpius raised his hand.

"Mr. Malfoy! Well now, we'll just add you to a group then shall we? Ms. Weasley, Ms. Phillips? Mr. Malfoy will join your group I think, get the Head Boy and Girl working together."

This suggestion was met with a polite nod of the head from Lauren Phillips, and an ill-disguised grimace from Rose Weasley.

Scorpius shrugged off his cloak and placed it over the back of his chair, removing his wand as he went. Rose Weasley and Lauren Phillips had taken up residence in the back corner of the room closest the door, and he awkwardly shuffled towards them.

They stood there talking, their heads almost touching as Scorpius stood off to one side, uncomfortably waiting for them to finish their conversation.

"Shall we get started then?" Rose suggested, half ignoring the blonde-haired boy.

Scorpius nodded, and raised his wand.

"Well then, what are you waiting for?" Lauren enquired, and without saying a word, he waved his wand in a complex motion, and suddenly in his place stood a grandfather clock.

* * *

><p>Rose was impressed despite herself. It was weird looking at the elegant timepiece as if it contained a person, and suddenly she didn't know where to look. But one thing was for certain; Scorpius Malfoy was seriously talented when it came to Transfiguration.<p>

She knew that if was far more difficult to transfigure yourself into an object with moving parts than something elementary like a nightstand or a desk. The intricate nature of a clock made it doubly as difficult, and the transfiguration of watches was considered a specialised talent.

"Extremely impressive," came a voice from behind them, and Professor McGonagall walked across the classroom for a closer look. "Ms. Phillips, Ms. Weasley, you aren't supposed to stand there gawking at Mr. Malfoy no matter how good the piece of magic is, hurry up and change him back!"

Rose snapped out of her thought-train for the second time that lesson, and hurriedly waved her wand. There was a small 'pop' like there had been when he'd changed himself initially, and Scorpius Malfoy returned to them, looking uninjured.

"Excellent, excellent both of you. Mr. Malfoy, that was an outstanding demonstration of _temporis _transfiguration, was that a particular timepiece you changed into?" "It was the cloak in the hall at home, Professor," he mumbled, and Professor McGonagall nodded knowingly. "While still very remarkable Mr. Malfoy, work on transfiguring yourself into an object you imagine rather than one you know. Makes the exercise much more challenging, since you apparently are in need of added difficulty," "Thank you Professor," Scorpius replied, his head bowed.

**Good news and bad news. Good news first? I have finished all my assignments, and hopefully another chapter will be forthcoming very soon. Bad news? I have exams in a few weeks, and that's going to eat into any writing time I have. I also get shocking writers block, and blow hot and cold on stories in the space of about five minutes. It makes it very hard to get anything done. If you've got any hints, it would definitely be appreciated**


	8. Chapter 8

**Hope you enjoy it... as always please read and then leave me a review with what you thought!**

"I can't believe him, I mean the sheer arrogance!" Rose blustered, as they sat in the Great Hall on their morning break.

She was joined by Lauren and Dominique, who having had two free periods while Transfiguration had been occurring, had proceeded to achieve nothing at all with her time.

"What happened?" Dominique asked, as she absent-mindedly played with a strand of hair.

"Rose is angry because Scorpius Malfoy out-performed her in Transfiguration today, and it's never happened before," Lauren answered quickly.

"That's not true," Rose insisted.

"No it's not," replied Dominique lazily, "he has out-performed you before. One time when me and Angie..."

"Angie and I," Rose interrupted.

"Shut up. When me and angie," she said forcefully, "were kept back for accidentally turning a desk into a flock of chickens when we were supposed to be transfiguring cushions into monkeys, I argued that we were made to look bad because we had you in our class."

"Aw, thanks Dom," Rose said, with a smile.

"Yeah, but McGonagall shot back that 'Scorpius Malfoy' in the other class with the Ravenclaws was the best Transfiguration student in the year level."

Rose did her best not to look annoyed at this particular piece of information, but Lauren smiled at her.

"You can tell that hurt," she said, with a cheeky grin.

"How have I not noticed this before though?" Rose wondered aloud. "And how do you remember that Dom but you can't remember simple things like Gamps Laws of Elemental Transfiguration?"

Dominique shrugged, but Lauren answered her first question.

"Well, we only had Herbology and Defence Against the Dark Arts with the Slytherins last year, and from memory I don't think we've ever had Transfiguration with Slytherin."

Rose glanced up, scrutinizing the Hall to see if the topic of their conversation was present. Indeed he was, seated by himself at the Slytherin table, reading a book, his face shielded as per normal by a curtain of blonde hair.

"It's weird though," Rose began in a confidential tone, "have you two ever really thought about him before he became Head Boy? It's like he didn't exist."

"I only noticed him when he had Albus' wand pointed between his eyes, or James' boot in his stomach," confessed Lauren.

The other two girls conferred with this assessment. It was indeed odd that they had only started noticing his presence once the badge had gone on, it was like he hadn't even been there.

* * *

><p>Scorpius was walking out of the Great Hall, into the courtyard, when a familiar voice called his name.<p>

"Malfoy!" cried Albus Potter, walking up behind him.

He cringed at the voice, and turned as slowly as he could to face him.

"You showed me up in Transfiguration today," Albus spat, as the ranks of Albus' minions was swelled by other onlookers. They all knew what was coming.

"Professor McGonagall said that I should learn a lesson from Scorpius Malfoy, and set me extra work. Well, right here, free of charge, I'm going to teach you a lesson, Head Boy or not!"

Albus pulled his wand out, and used a leg-locker curse on Scorpius. If Scorpius hadn't been about to have his head kicked in, he would have pointed out the irony of Albus using a verbal spell to 'teach him a lesson', but as he collapsed sideways to general laughter, he instead considered whether or not to use the counter charm.

Silently, Scorpius prayed that a teacher would walk past and put a stop to it, but in the meantime, he opted to removed the curses effects, and levered himself back to his feet. He was immediately hit from behind with a stunner, knocking him forwards onto his chest. The crowd began to laugh louder and some cheered.

Albus smirked, and sent another curse Scorpius' way, causing his legs to jerk uncontrollably, but given that he was lying down, all it succeeded in doing was smacking his forehead into the masonry.

He could see droplets of blood on the stone as he recovered enough from the stunner to remove the curse from his legs that was causing so much hilarity.

Albus then laughed as he kicked Scorpius in the ribs while he lay prone, and then raised his arms where some of the crowd began to applaud.

"Alright, get to class!" came the cry from an older voice, and students began to scatter. "Come on get a move on! You too Malfoy!"

Scorpius groaned at the sound of Professor Albert Proudfoot, a former ministry Auror who had taken the Defence Against the Dark Arts post after the war had finished. He was notorious for his hatred of Death Eaters, and in his eyes, their offspring were no better.

He struggled to his knees, a hand on the stone as he tried to get to his feet. He glanced up, and his eyes were drawn to one individual in particular.

A red headed girl with a badge that read 'Head Girl' was clutching her book bag tightly as she stood there watching him, ignoring the commotion around her as students rushed away from the scene. Scorpius momentarily broke eye contact as he reached for the edge of the fountain as leverage, and she turned, and strode away through the crowd.

* * *

><p>Rose sat cross-legged at the back of Divination, muttering none too subtly about her opinion on the subject as Professor Firenze wandered into the classroom. The entire class looked enthralled simply by his entrance, as his hooves padded gently on the moss-floored classroom.<p>

Classroom Eleven was completely unique in Hogwarts, in so much that it had not a stone floor, but one that was moss and lichen covered, and had trees that grew to the ceiling. It was, however, unique also because the entire population of the class since OWLs was female.

Dominique had convinced Rose it was worthwhile continuing with Divination, and Rose had agreed in a moment of weakness, despite her cousin's argument having the fundamental flaw that its main proponent didn't actually believe any of it. Still, her options had been Astronomy, Care of Magical Creatures or this, and the prospect of spending most of a class lying down staring at the ceiling which was bewitched to replicate the night sky wasn't too horrible.

"So where did you disappear off to before?" Dominique whispered, as they stared absent-mindedly at the stars.

"To see if I could bust Albus for breaking a rule," Rose chuckled.

"Oho, I wish I was there to see that. So what did you give him, detention? Please don't say you docked points, Rosie, I mean, he is in Gryffindor."

Rose paused, and an inexplicable guilty sensation took hold.

"Nothing."

"I thought I heard something about a fight, surely a sassy 'what's going on here' wouldn't have gone amiss."

"He was fighting Scorpius Malfoy."

"Oh."

There was a pause, as they both let the silence fester a little.

"So what did you do?" Dominique asked, sounding intrigued.

"Nothing," Rose replied shortly. "Albus is family, Malfoy is not."

"Do you think Malfoy will tell anyone? Do you think he'll go to McGonagall?" Dominique asked, rolling onto her side to face her cousin.

Rose had been thinking about this for some time, and wondered whether she should advocate on Albus' behalf or not at some point or other.

"I can't remember him ever having said anything before though," Dominique added, voicing Rose's thoughts.

It was another strange phenomenon that she couldn't quite comprehend. Albus, and James before him, certainly had given Scorpius Malfoy more than his fair share of public beatings, and she was sure there were many she hadn't been privy to, but not once could she remember Scorpius saying anything that might have caused problems for either of the Potter boys, even when it ended in him receiving a punishment for being presumed to have instigated or at least been involved in the dispute.

If Rose was honest, she could remember several occasions where Albus or James had gleefully accused Scorpius of being the only guilty party.

She consoled herself with the idea he must have caused at least some of the ugly brawls she'd witnessed, otherwise Albus and James wouldn't have detested him so much, because they weren't those kind of people. Her confidence in this resolution wasn't solid, however, but the entire event intrigued her.

* * *

><p>Scorpius lay casually across the couch, spreading himself in comfortably so his feet rested on one of the arms as he reread the notes he taken in potions after lunch. As a seventh year, he was blessed with several free periods, one of which had fallen in what would have been his final lesson of the day.<p>

Instead of retreating to the library as he normally would, and enduring cold glares and colder shoulders, he took advantage of his new surrounds, and moved himself into the Heads Dormitory.

He heard the entrance portrait creak open, and he kept his eyes on his book, away from the latest arrival. She, however, had other ideas, and walked over to the couches, depositing her bag on the small coffee table next to Scorpius' stack of books.

He glanced at her, a surprised expression on his face, but resolved to ignore her, or at least appear to. She too positioned herself across the couch; sitting with her back against the inside of the arm, opposite to the one Scorpius was resting upon, on the other side of the fire.

She was gently nibbling on the end of her quill, before scratching out something in the book she was holding.

"Good first day back?" came the polite question.

Scorpius did a double take, and the silence became uncomfortable. Had she really just enquired how his day had been?

"Ah, fine thank you," he replied quietly, wondering whether this was an invitation for open conversation. "Y...your day?" he managed to tack onto the end of his sentence with a slight stutter.

"Good, good. Well, apart from... you know. That little misunderstanding in the courtyard," the red-haired girl replied.

Scorpius looked up finally, and met her inquisitive gaze with his own cold one. Rose was struck by how much his eyes looked like those childhood photos she'd seen of his father. He slammed his books shut, and collected all his belongings off the coffee table, then stood up.

"Don't even bother," he said, fighting to keep his tone even. "If you're worried that I'll report you for not intervening or your dear cousin for hexing me, you can rest easy tonight."

Rose clearly realised that she hadn't been quite as subtle as she might have hoped.

"No, Malfoy, that's not..."

"Save it, don't say anything else you don't mean. I'm not going to say anything; you don't have to worry about your precious Head Girl badge. No one is going to stop you from punishing those dastardly rule breakers."

* * *

><p>If the situation had been different, Rose would have marvelled at his use of irony when referring to rule breaking, but it was as he walked away and slammed the door to his bedroom that Rose realised that was the closest she had come to a proper conversation with Scorpius Malfoy.<p>

She stared at the door for some time, thinking on the implications of this realisation. It was strange to think that they'd shared classes, she'd even been forced to sit next to him a couple of times when she'd been late, yet she had never engaged him in a conversation as long as that had been.

It took the shock of remembering that Dominique and Lauren had been waiting outside the portrait hole for probably ten minutes to raise her out of her reverie.

"You bitch!" came the protest from her cousin, as the long blonde hair appeared, followed by a body.

Dominique straightened up, and then repeated her insult with more vigour.

"Alright, I'm sorry for leaving you two outside in the cold, but calling me a bitch twice? Really necessary?"

"I'd say that the second one would be warranted due to the fact that you have your own common room and bedroom while I have to exist with this princess who leaves her clothing everywhere and steals my stuff from the bathroom," Lauren guessed, taking in the sight.

"I didn't steal it!" Dominique said loudly, "I assumed it was mine!"

"Of course you did, Dom," Rose laughed, "you assume everything you see is yours."

Her two friends proceeded to tour the establishment in infinite detail, taking in all elements of her new residence.

"You even have your own cupboards, what I would give for my own cupboards!" Dominique shouted from the bedroom.

"Have you heard of an inside voice, Dom?" hissed Lauren, as she stuck her head around the door, "We aren't the only people here!"

Rose wandered into her bedroom behind them, and Dominique turned on her instead.

"Speaking of which, how did your appeal for clemency go down with your housemate?"

"What are you two on about?" Lauren asked.

Dominique began to give a blow by blow account of what had transpired that day that Lauren had missed.

"Yes I heard Malfoy got beat up, so what? It's not like it's the first time it's happened, nor the last I imagine," Lauren interrupted, but Dominique waved her down.

"No, but you don't understand. Rosie here suddenly had a panic attack because she was terrified Malfoy would go to McGonagall and tell her that Rose wasn't doing her job. So... did you ask Malfoy about it?"

"This is going to have ended badly," Lauren suggested astutely, and Rose nodded.

"Yes I mentioned, and yes it ended badly. I tried to be subtle, but he called me out straight away and stormed off," Rose announced, to which Lauren shook her head.

"I surprised Malfoy has enough spine to physically storm anywhere," Dominique said, as the three of them arranged themselves comfortably around the room, "whenever I see him he's busy taking a beating from someone."

"Do you guys notice him otherwise?" Rose asked, looking intrigued, "I mean apart from when he's getting beaten up?" It was bugging her, why was it that she hadn't even given him the time of day until he became Head Boy?

"Sorry babe, but I have better things to do than consider what Malfoy spends his day doing. My minds not vile enough to even get close I'd think," Dominique replied, fiddling with her blood red fingernails.

"A little bit," Lauren confessed, and Dominique turned to her.

"Why the hell would you want to do a thing like that?"

Lauren sat quietly, and picked embarrassedly at the quilt on Rose's bed.

"I don't know. He's weird, I know, but I mean, how can someone who is that smart, with that heritage simply go unnoticed? It doesn't make any sense."

Rose nodded her head in agreement.

"There's definitely something different about him. He's not like anyone else here," she said, and Dominique threw her hands up in frustration.

"What is this, the Malfoy Watching Society? Don't you two have better things to do than worry about our year levels pet punching bag?"

"Why though?" Rose replied, getting to the crux of her problem, "why is he hated by everyone? Why do I hate him? Why does Albus, and James before him, insist on beating the living daylights out of him and tormenting him at every turn? I mean, he's smart," she began, ticking off qualities on her hand.

"He's polite," Lauren added.

"He's humble," Rose ticked off.

"He's compassionate," Lauren submitted.

"And," Rose added with a blush, "he is outrageously attractive."

Lauren turned to her with her eyes open, and mouth in a wide grin, while Dominique spluttered indignantly.

"Yes! I thought I was the only one who noticed, but behind that curtain of hair, Mr. Malfoy is like an ethereal being, he's almost beautiful!" She exclaimed, clearly happy that she wasn't delusional.

"No... No way!" shouted Dominique loudly over their excited chatter. "There is no way in heaven or hell that Malfoy is anything approaching handsome. Take it from me, if he was, I would know wouldn't you think?"

But Rose and Lauren were smiling smugly and sharing sidelong looks at each other, enjoying their shared revelation.

"No! I won't have it!" Dominique announced, "Smart, polite, humble and whatever other bullshit you listed may be true, but there is no way some male model material would have escaped my eyes... or hands."

"You can't see it normally," explained Lauren gently, "he has his face covered by his hair normally, so people don't notice,"

"What are you, his stalker?" Dominique exclaimed.

"It's true," Rose explained, "I only noticed today when Albus was attacking him, and I thought it was a trick of the light, but then I saw him again just now,"

"This is an absolute joke," announced Dominique, getting to her feet. "I am going to settle this for myself."

* * *

><p>Dominique marched from Rose's bedroom, pushing the door open with a loud bang, and stormed across the common room. She reached Scorpius' bedroom door, and without knocking, barged into the room.<p>

Scorpius was sitting on the ledge seat by the open window, reading over his completed potions essay with some pride, when he heard the thud of footsteps, and his door was wrenched open with a bang.

If he hadn't heard the footsteps, he thought he may have fallen out of the open window, but as it was he tilted slightly, and his hand slipped on the wet slate tiling of the tower outside. To his horror, he watched as two of his pieces of parchment swirled away into the stormy night, quickly ruined beyond rescue. This loss momentarily distracted him from the fact he was no longer alone.

"Malfoy!"

He turned to find himself uncomfortably close to one Dominique Weasley, the blonde half-Veela that he knew was one of the Head Girl's best friends, as well as cousin.

"Don't look away!" came a commanding voice as Malfoy sought to raise himself to his feet, completely shocked by the intrusion. His mind wasn't functioning properly; he couldn't formulate a single plausible explanation for what was occurring.

"Stay still!" were his next instructions, as he lowered himself back down, but it was the warm hand that swept his unkept blonde hair from his eyes that really scared him. The blonde haired Weasley stared for a minute, her mouth open.

"Well, what do you know..." she breathed quietly, removing her hand and the warm touch with it.

Like she was only half awake, she backed away, and stumbled from his room. Scorpius stood in the doorway, and watched as Rose and her other friend, Lauren, grabbed her and dragged her back into Rose's room, with a few choice swear words muttered under their breaths.

Scorpius had been spending a lot of time being confused in his seventh year, more than any other time of his life combined.

He shrugged slightly to himself, and shut his door. It beat having his butt kicked, that was for sure, regardless of the fact he'd have to go back and rewrite those two sheets of parchment all over. He could deal with the weirdly ambivalent, if it meant he wasn't on the receiving end of the other kind of attention.

* * *

><p><strong>I can see all of you, you are jumping up and down pointing at Scorpius shouting, "he's a male Mary Sue! Look, look, it's another one, I found another one!"<strong>

**I'm sorry. Truly I am. I hate myself a little for making it so. But you can't deny that it makes the plot work. I mean, given how superficial and narcissistic we already know Rose and friends are, would it make sense if she noticed Scorpius if he was ugly and stupid? No, she'd continue thinking of him as she always had. I'm trying to exaggerate the ridiculous yet appalling nature of his treatment, and by making him the apparently ideal model from which to cast your boy, it enhances this sense. Well that's my justification, anyway. Maybe I just don't want hideously ugly, stupid characters. It makes them harder to connect with... or maybe that's a deficiency of my writing.**

**On another note, my friend had a chat with Tom Felton in a pub in London the other day... apparently he's a really nice guy.**

**Anyway, please take a second to leave me a review; you can't imagine how great they are when I'm trying to motivate myself to keep writing, I legitimately read them all for your thoughts and opinions :)**

**Ps. Sorry for the ridiculously long A/N... guess this probably isn't helping.**


	9. Chapter 9

**I hoping that this isn't like other stories people have read. I'm aiming to be different, slightly anyway. Hope you enjoy, please read and review!**

* * *

><p>"I can't believe you just did that!"<p>

Lauren and Rose were standing with their hands on their hips, staring at Dominique as if she had sprouted an extra head.

For her part, Dominique collapsed into a sitting position on Rose's bed, looking as mortified as Rose had ever known her to.

"He's actually good looking..." she muttered to herself, as if saying it out loud was helping her to understand it to be true.

"I wasn't lying," Lauren replied, as Rose shook her head in disbelief.

"But... he's like Teddy's better looking sibling, only he has blonde hair and blue eyes..." Dominique said, still sounding distant.

"Alright Dom, you can stop with the crazy. I think this is getting a little much. He's still a Malfoy after all," Lauren replied, patting Dominique on the back gently, as Rose sat down in her desk chair, and folded her legs underneath herself.

"But you're intrigued, no?" Rose asked, absent-mindedly chewing the end of a quill, "because you're right, he is good looking under all that blonde hair, he's obviously smart, so why do we all hate him so much?"

"I honestly don't know," Lauren responded.

"Well, I for one don't like the idea that my hatred is completely misplaced. I think we should make a conscious effort over the next few weeks, to track him, see what he does, see if he acts in a way that warrants my inherent hatred of him,"

"Don't think you can call it hatred anymore," Lauren pointed out, "given what we've just said."

"More importantly," Dominique added, her momentary lapse forgotten, "that sounds a little stalker-ish. And when I say a little, I mean very much like stalking. And that's creepy, and I don't do creepy. Creepy is fifth year boys following me to the girls bathrooms, and that's not something I'm about to take up as a pastime."

"Dom, I'm fairly sure you announced at breakfast that you were going to take a shower, just to see how many boys' ears pricked up at the news," Lauren retorted sharply.

"Beside the point," Dominique replied coolly, "I don't particularly want to be accused of doing the same, no matter what my own methods may be."

"I'm not proposing hiding round corners," Rose said, "but just keeping an eye out. Nothing proactive, just passive observation. I know you're both interested in him, I can see that,"

"Isn't it just a tad shallow to do this _after_ we discover he is bloody attractive?" Lauren asked, looking between her friends.

"Never stopped me before," Dominique answered.

"Yes well, you were never exactly the moral compasses equivalent of true north though, were you?" 

Rose ignored this.

"It's not like you get to see it much. His hair is so long it covers half his face, and nobody else is going to expect us to be watching him, they'll all put it down to us criticizing or something."

"I'm so glad everyone automatically assumes that's what we're doing. Really, makes me feel like a wonderful person," Lauren said sarcastically.

"Well, if it turns out I'm right, and Malfoy is about as harmless as your average Pygmy-Puff, then I'm not sure we deserve anything better. But mainly, I think its Dom's fault," added Rose with a smile.

* * *

><p>The first two weeks of the school year passed without major occurrence for Scorpius. Naturally, Albus Potter tried to hex him multiple times in the corridors, and succeeded in cornering him in a dead-end corridor at the end of his first week, but all up, things were not awful for him.<p>

The Head's Dormitory served as an excellent refuge, and although Madame Pince had told him that he should spend more time in the library, he found himself isolated more and more, and this was no bad thing. 

It meant he had somewhere to escape to if he knew Albus or his followers were after him, somewhere that they were unable to access, along with a comfortable bed and a desk where he could work in peace.

Of course, his schoolwork was his priority, and he worked much harder than even a student desiring the very highest marks would be required to, and using the class time to perfect the incantations. He never made the same mistake as he had in that first Transfiguration lesson, however, and despite Professor McGonagall's best attempts, he refused to perform anything out of the ordinary. Albus' retributions simply weren't worth it.

The first serious problem he encountered during the year came at breakfast on the third Monday of the school year. He was seated quietly, having finished his food before anyone else had arrived, reading a copy of a highly advanced potion making book from the Restricted Section of the library, when Professor Slughorn rose to his feet.

The Great Hall was now at capacity, as students busied themselves preparing for a new school day and the beginning of a new week. Scorpius had Transfiguration to look forward to, and his three foot essay on imagined transfigurations was sitting on his bed in his dormitory, ready to be delivered to Professor McGonagall's desk.

Slughorn's movement in itself was unusual, as the portly Professor normally kept physical exertion to a minimum, but he made his way to the lectern and addressed an interested student body.

"It has been brought to my attention," he began congenially, "by Mr. Thompson, Slytherin's estimable Quidditch captain, that only three students have put their names down to try out for the team this year."

Scorpius didn't have any doubts as to why that was, and he was sure no one else did either. The Slytherin Quidditch team hadn't won the cup for 25 years, since before the war, and several third place finishes were the only high points in a string of last places that littered the record books. 

The team was a miserable place to be, and most members of the house avoided it like the plague. It was a popular joke amongst students to ask which of the _three_ houses was going to win this year.

Professor Slughorn continued.

"Therefore, I have gained permission from the Headmistress on the team's behalf to run a compulsory trial to fill the five remaining places on the team."

"We require a beater, a keeper, a seeker and two chasers to fill the void left by last year's departing members, and so on Thursday evening every student from fifth year and above, and any from the younger years who wish to attend, will report to the Quidditch Pitch straight after dinner is concluded to partake in the trial."

"I repeat, participation is not optional. Attendance will be taken. I look forward to seeing you all on Thursday evening."

The laughter from the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw tables could barely be heard over the jeering that erupted from the red and gold house.

* * *

><p>Albus Potter had declared in the Gryffindor Common Room midweek that he wanted as many members of the house present as possible for Slytherin's attempt at constructing a Quidditch team. <p>

While all but his most ardent fans and followers had ignored this suggestion of an evening's Slytherin-baiting, Rose found herself following Lauren and Dominique down to the Quidditch pitch, wrapped up snugly in her winter cloak and a Gryffindor scarf tied around her neck.

The pitch was floodlit, and probably 50 Slytherin students stood, shivering in a motley array of outfits, waiting for instructions. 

Rose took her seat between Dominique and Lauren in the stand, as her ever-respectful cousin started a chant amongst those who were decked out in the red and gold.

The grass was moist with condensation, and the light punctured the fog as Flynn Thomas, captain of Slytherin's Quidditch team, and his sole remaining team member, the beater Benjamin Peake, addressed those who were assembled in front of him. 

"Alright Slytherin house, to warm up, I want you to jog a lap of the pitch!" he declared loudly, which was met with groans from the assembled prisoners.

"No arguing!" boomed Professor Slughorn, who sat comfortably in the front row on the opposite side of the pitch, his voice magically magnified. He had also brought his own bewitched brazier, and had transfigured one of the benches into a plush armchair. 

The Gryffindors heckled as the bunch slowly made their way past, and Rose spotted the unmistakeable bobbing blonde hair go past towards the back of the pack. She smiled despite herself; even the Head Boy hadn't escaped this one.

Flynn Thomas immediately dismissed any of the students who had been left behind by the main group, declaring them not fit enough to make it worth their while getting on a broom. Several students looked like they wished they'd done the same thing.

There were probably 40 students remaining, and laid out on the grass waiting for them was the schools entire collection of brooms, used for flying lessons for the first years. They were ratty old things, ruined by years of misuse, but Thomas commanded his charges to position themselves next to a broom.

Much like in first year, the initial test was broom control. Each student summoned their brooms with a sharp "up!"

The results were mixed, much to the dismay of the elderly Madame Hooch, who had remained as the first years Flying Instructor, but was too long in the tooth to continue refereeing Quidditch matches. She had joined Professor Slughorn on the sidelines, to observe the process, and showed little sign of being impressed by what she saw.

Another five students were shed based on their inability to perform this rudimentary task, and the remaining 35 students were told to mount their brooms, and hover with their toes still touching the grass.

"Be careful though, the school brooms have a tendency to lean to the left, and if you lose control and gain to much altitude, they will begin to vibrate," Flynn Thomas informed them.

After roughly 10 students had failed to maintain their height satisfactorily, and another two had completely lost it and either crashed, in the fifth year's case, or simply let go and fallen off in the seventh year girl's case, they were down to about 20 candidates.

"Alright, do a lap of the pitch, around the back of either set of goalposts, and then back to me," Flynn Thomas instructed.

Rose watched as Scorpius Malfoy, who had managed all the tasks thus far, remounted his broom looking slightly ginger about it, and kicked off.

* * *

><p>Scorpius kicked off, and while his newly acquired blue hooded jumper and tracksuit pants kept the worst of the chill off, it couldn't save him from the burning of the icy wind in his face. <p>

He hadn't flown a broom since he was in first year, when compulsory flying lessons had been held, but he remembered that he'd been not bad for someone who'd never flown before. He even remembered Madam Hooch saying that he was a bit like his father on a broom, and he assumed it was a compliment. In fact she'd encouraged him to try out for his house team, as he recalled.

Of course, he'd done nothing of the sort, not wanting to draw undue attention to himself, but his heart swelled with a pride similar to that he'd felt on the day it happened when he recalled that event.

The first length of the pitch he spent getting to grips with his broom, and the uncanny feeling of sitting with your feet dangling thirty feet off the grass, but as he gently controlled his ancient Cleansweep around the back of the hoops, his confidence grew.

It was something you never forgot, Madam Hooch had said, and she was right. Once the initial shock had passed, everything started to come back to him. 

His hair was flowing in the wind, and despite the cold, and forced nature of the situation, a smile spread across his face. This was how he remembered it, flying was fun, and it was something one did for pleasure.

He leaned low against the handle of his broom, urging it forward, and he zoomed past most of the other students, pushing down on the handle of the broom to fly below them, his toes skimming the surface of the pitch, and then pulling up on it to rise back up to the height of the hoops.

By the time he landed, the third in the group to do so, his exhilarated grin had help him forget that a large proportion of Gryffindor house were chanting and name calling, despite both Professor's attempts at quietening them.

* * *

><p>As another ten or so students who had failed to demonstrate satisfactory control of their broomsticks trudged from the field with a range of emotions from relief to unadulterated joy lining their faces, the real Quidditch equipment was brought out.<p>

"Did you see that?" Lauren asked, leaning in.

"See what?" Dominique asked.

"Yeah, I did see it, he was grinning like..."

"Like the Cheshire Cat," Lauren finished for her, before answering the unasked question simply with "reference from a muggle book."

"Are you two discussing bloody Malfoy again?" Dominique asked.

"Didn't you notice his smile? It looked like his face was about to split in half," Rose replied.

"Alright, alright, so I confessed he's really good looking, but no need for you two to wax lyrical about the sexiness of his smile," Dominique said moodily.

"No, it wasn't sexy," Rose answered, watching the Slytherin's, or a Slytherin, take the brooms back into the sky, "it was more pure joy. It was weird, it looked almost like he'd forgotten what that felt like."

* * *

><p><strong>I dunno about you guys, but I'm a sucker for a good game of Quidditch. Fictionally of course, not actually. I've heard about those college students who run around looking stupid, doesn't appeal really. Guess you don't know unless you've tried it. Anyway, don't dismiss it as a plot point, because it's important. Don't worry though, it won't be that ridiculous situation where the new player single handedly wins them the trophy. That aint gonna be happening...<br>Anyway, please leave your thoughts in the form of a review, I read and take into account all your thoughts, good and bad.**


	10. Chapter 10

**Okay, so I understand some of you are going to ask where I've been. To be honest, I don't really feel like telling you the full story, we'll just leave it as a family event. Anyway, moral of the story is, I didn't feel much like writing for a few weeks, but now I'm back and better than ever... hopefully. As always, please read and review!**

It was dark, it was cold, and everything was developing a thin layer of moisture because the evening dew. Broom handles were slippery, robes were cold and damp, and Scorpius was loving every minute of it. The proper Quidditch equipment had been produced, and brooms had been discarded for the time being.

Several members of Slytherin house, mostly male, obviously felt that they had done enough to retain their pride, but weren't going to risk actually being selected. They soon were trudging up the muddy hill to the bright lights of the castle, honour supposedly intact. Those who either had too much pride, or were actually enjoying themselves, were standing around on the ground in a kind of circuit style workout, where each student had a few minutes of playing each position.

The beaters were using the bats to smack unbewitched bludgers from the Quidditch storeroom, seekers were leaping around trying to snatch golf balls that were doubling as snitches, and the chasers and keepers were throwing the quaffle amongst themselves. All in all, it looked like a complete shambles, as Flynn Thomas wandered around, making notes on a clipboard he had brought along.

Next, brooms were added, for increased difficulty, and Scropius found himself in the group of chasers, who were attempting to score past potential keepers. Not much could be said for the flying skills of the potential keepers, in Scorpius' limited experience with the sport, given that they let every single one of his shots through.

* * *

><p>"Why did we do that?" asked Dominique, wrapping her red and gold scarf tightly around her neck.<p>

"Do what?" asked Rose absentmindedly, as they trudged up the hill to the school.

"You know, go and watch Slytherin's quidditch trials. It's much to groupie-esqe for my liking. You guys can't honestly be that interested in Scorpius Malfoy, he's simply not that interesting."

"We went for Albu..." Rose began to reply, but Dominique cut her off.

"That's bullshit Rose. You and I both know Albus is an insufferable little berk. Since when did we do what he told us to? We could have spent an evening in front of the fire doing our nails, anything rather than this!" she moaned bitterly.

"I'm surprised Rose even agreed to be further than a minute away from her textbooks. I thought she sprouted an extra limb she has her book bag over her shoulder so much," Lauren smiled, as Rose gave her a cold glare. "I'm not that bad. Come on, forget this, let's get inside and get warm."

* * *

><p>It was awkward. Even by Scorpius' unusually lofty standards of awkwardness when it came to forcedly civil social interaction, it was bad. Scorpius had managed to time his arrival on the fourth floor from the Entrance Hall at exactly the same time Rose Weasley had arrived back from the Gryffindor Common Room.<p>

They had performed an excruciating two-step around one another without their eyes ever meeting, and in the flickering torchlight, they silently settled on Rose leading the charge with Scorpius trailing behind her. Rose muttered the password, and stepped through the portrait hole, as Scorpius scrambled to make sure it didn't shut in his face.

There were no words exchanged as they went their separate ways, but if Scorpius had looked back, he would have seen his opposite, in every sense of the word, turn back with a puzzled expression on her face, as if she wasn't quite sure what she was supposed to make of something.

* * *

><p>A week to the day later, Scorpius was standing in the dungeons, feeling cold and slightly apprehensive. It wasn't the potions part of the equation that was bothering him either, it was the Gryffindor part. If he had to have a class with them, why could it not be Arithmancy, something harmless? After Albus Potter had put a Weasley's Wizard Wheezes Wildfire Whiz-Bang into his Hair Raising Potion in second year, potions had become somewhat of a terrifying prospect when it involved Gryffindors.<p>

The previous week, as with all his classes, had been an introductory session, a 'welcome to you NEWT year' which had addressed expectations and an initial piece of assessment, reviewing the previous year's course. This week, however, it was time to begin class for real, with proper assessed NEWT coursework, and his heart was fluttering slightly.

This was either the beginning of the best or the worst year of his life. There was nothing in between. Professor Slughorn moved into view in a motion most comparable to that of a walrus, he vast bulk giving him a slug like quality which once Scorpius had first noticed, he'd found extremely hard to shake.

For some reason, as he passed, Professor Slughorn gave Scorpius a dark look, before continuing through the small group of students to the door of his dungeon classroom. Scorpius quickly forgot about this however, as Albus and his Gryffindor cronies arrived, late as per usual. They were of course loud and obnoxious, and Scorpius backed away further into the shadows, making sure he got into the classroom before Albus realised he would be there.

He found his usual seat, and slipped his cloak over the chair, taking out his books from underneath his arm and placing them on the table. He was the only student in the class without his own cauldron of any kind, so he quickly and quietly made his way to the cupboard in the hopes of borrowing one without anyone noticing, as he had always done.

* * *

><p>Rose removed her books and her collapsible cauldron from her bag, and placed them on the table in the front row, as the rest of the class settled around her. With her mother as the head of a ministry division and her father a leading Auror, the Weasley's were no longer short of a galleon.<p>

In fact, it was quite the opposite, they had gone from one of the poorest pureblood families to one of the richest mixed-blood families, and Ron and Hermione bought only the best for their beloved children.

Rose's collapsible gold cauldron was nearly as good as money could buy, better even than the one Professor Slughorn had sitting on his desk. Rose had deliberately selected a burnished gold, trying to avoid standing out too much, but cousin Albus had no such qualms. He had selected a bright gold cauldron, collapsible naturally, with silver edging and an adaptive self-stirring charm.

As wealthy as Ron and Hermione had become, they could never hope to compare to 'The Choosen One'. Not many in the wizarding world could, and Albus Potter's cauldron was a reflection of that. Professor Slughorn's eyes had been as big as saucers when he'd first seen it, and much time was spent extolling the particular virtues of Albus' model of cauldron with a wistful expression.

* * *

><p>"Mr. Malfoy!" exclaimed the man in question, and suddenly the ambient noise of the classroom died, as Professor Slughorn addressed the boy who was standing at the ingredient cupboard.<p>

Rose glanced up and found herself confronted with a very peculiar sight; Scorpius Malfoy was in the process of removing a cauldron from the bottom shelf of the ingredient cupboard, one of the standard pewter, school-issue cauldrons. Her confusion was momentarily suppressed as Professor Slughorn continued to address the schools resident leper.

"Mr. Malfoy, I have been meaning to speak with you."

Scorpius simply turned, his cheeks reddening as he was caught in the embarrassing predicament, but his professor showed no signs of releasing him.

"Flynn Thomas, your Quidditch captain, came and spoke to me, informing me that you had missed two training sessions in succession, the first two of the season!"

The tone of outrage and accusation had lost its usual jovial edge, and now Rose watched a look of complete confusion crossed Malfoy's features.

He clearly had no idea what was going on, despite it being pretty self-explanatory, in Rose's opinion.

"Quidditch sir?" Malfoy repeated.

"Yes Quidditch Malfoy. You were supposed to be at practice and you weren't. Well, what do you have to say for yourself?"

"I'm in the Quidditch team?" Malfoy asked slowly.

"Yes, of course you're in the Quidditch team, why else would I be asking about it? You aren't going to try and claim that you were unaware of it are you? The notice has been in the Slytherin Common Room since last week, with training times clearly marked. If you can't make it, you should have spoken to your team captain!"

"I didn't see the notice," Malfoy answered quietly, but Slughorn was having none of it.

"That is unacceptable Malfoy, completely unacceptable, especially from the Head Boy. You will serve detention with me tonight and tomorrow night, and in the meantime, you will speak to Thomas, and find out what you can do to make up for it. I will not have you abandoning your house! Now return to your seat."

Scorpius Malfoy trudged slowly back to his place, borrowed cauldron in hand. The heading on the board was "Healing Potions – NEWT level" and underneath it were the instructions for the fiendishly tricky Blood Replenishing potion. As with all healing potions, there was no leeway with the proportions or method; everything had to be chopped to the millimetre, and stirred no half turns more or less than the exact directions.

"A challenge, ladies and gentlemen," Professor Slughorn began in a manner Rose assumed he thought to be grandiose, "to begin your final years tuition. If you can master this potion, you will be in excellent shape for your end of year exams, and, I daresay, have a career as a Healer readymade! So, what are you waiting for? Begin!"

Rose was almost frantic in her approach to the potion. There was no way anyone other than her was getting the top grade for this potion, she was born to brew, as her father had so elegantly put it. The incentive of being named a Healer in the making held no small attraction either.

She glanced around, after her cousins bright gold cauldron give off a piercing whistle and then a pop, while shaking itself uncontrollably until it collapsed off the side of the desk. Professor Slughorn, naturally, muttered under his breath about expensive cauldrons being placed in the wrong hands.

She wasn't about to reinforce that view however, as she chopped the root as finely as her silver knife would allow her, and tapped her bewitched ladle with the instructions of four counter-clockwise turn followed by one and a half clockwise ones.

Glancing up, she spied Scorpius Malfoy also slaving away behind his cauldron, and she paused to watch for a second. He was a couple of steps behind her, but looking at the surface of the substance he had brewed so far, his was the only other in the class that she could say was recognizably the correct colour and consistency.

He was, however, a couple of steps behind where she was, she noted with some glee, but he was being forced to stir his potion by hand as his school-issue cauldron had none of the complicated control spells for magical stirring that Rose's had come with.

* * *

><p>"Aaaaaaand... Time's up!" cried Professor Slughorn, as Scorpius through his ladle to the table, and wiped the accumulated sweat from his brow.<p>

The combination of the oppressive heat of the magical flame underneath his cauldron compared with the freezing outside temperature of the dungeon had drawn significant perspiration from Scorpius, and he was already dreaming a having a long shower, something he had grown uncharacteristically used to.

Professor Slughorn paced up and down the rows of seats, stopping at each cauldron and peering in hopefully, only to extract his nose rapidly to save it further pain and suffering. Albus Potter, in particular, had outdone himself, managing to melt his wooden desk into his spilt potion to produce a particularly noxious brown sludge that appeared to be bubbling on the stone floor.

Slughorn banished it the minute he lay eyes upon it. It was only once he got to Scorpius' cauldron that he nodded, and even risked the second sniff. On further investigation, he exclaimed with some glee.

"Look here class! Mr. Malfoy has done it! He has produced a very passable Blood Replenishing potion by clearly following the instructions to the letter. Well done Mr. Malfoy, consider your detentions more than compensated for!"

Scorpius couldn't help but to smile, as the Professor moved on. He couldn't even muster up a little annoyance when the potions professor virtually collapsed at Rose Weasley's feet, worshipping the very ground she stood on, declaring her potion to be better than any St. Mungo's Healer could have dreamed of.

She naturally feigned embarrassment, but Scorpius was unconcerned with the gleefulness of the Weasley's at that moment. He had avoided a detention, he grinned to no one in particular, as he filed out of the dungeon. Not just one either, but two of them! That never happened to him.

Well, normally he didn't receive detentions at all, but it certainly meant something to him. That kind of stuff happened to Albus, not to him usually, and it felt good to be on the receiving end of some good fortune.

His smile lasted all the way to the top of the dungeon stairs, where he found a displeased Flynn Thomas standing, his arms folded and a pointed look on his face.

**Can I be honest? I love Quidditch, so despite any protests of it being formulaic, it's being included. Hope you enjoyed this chapter, please leave me your thoughts and opinions, and if they're good (I'm sure they will be) you might even be able to spot your influence in subsequent chapters!**


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